Armistice centenary: The last soldiers to die in World War I

On November 3, 1918 - just eight days before the Armistice that ended World War I – one Australian soldier predicted his luck was up.

Corporal Albert Davey told his commanding officer he expected to die in the next day’s action –a hazardous attack across the Sambre–Oise Canal in France.

Captain Oliver Holmes Woodward, commander of the 1st Australian Tunnelling Company, told Davey not to be so foolish but agreed to send the corporal’s personal items to his wife if anything happened.

Davey’s foreboding proved tragically prescient.

Early the next day while Davey awaited the order to move ahead he was struck by German artillery fire and died.

Members of the 1st Australian Tunnelling Company. Three of their sappers died on November 4 1918 and were among the last Australians to die in combat during World War 1. (Australian War Memorial). (Supplied)Australian artillery units pursued retreating German forces in late October 1918. (Australian War Memorial). (Supplied)

He wasn’t the only Australian from his unit to die that day – sappers Arthur Johnson and Charles Barrett were also killed.

Australian War Memorial researchers have established they were probably the last Australian ground troops killed on the Western Front.

But that November day there were also other Australians who died so agonisingly close to the end of the war.

Three Australian Flying Corps pilots – Captain Thomas Baker and Lieutenants Parker Whitley Symons and Arthur John Palliser – were shot down and killed in a dogfight against German fighter planes.

Australian pilot Captain Thomas Baker, left, was shot down and killed just days before the Armistice was signed between the Allies and Germany that ended the war. (Photos: Australian War Memorial/AP). (Supplied)

Other Australians died from sickness and disease in the closing days of the war in France, Australia, Britain and the Middle East.

Soldiers from other Allied armies also died agonisingly close to the Armistice taking effect at 11am on November 11, 1918.

Briton Private George Edwin Ellison – a toughened four-year veteran – was shot dead at 9.30am on November 11 while he patrolled the outskirts of Mons in Belgium.

French soldier Augustin Trebuchon was delivering a message close to the River Meuse when he was killed at 10.45am.

French soldier Augustin Trebuchon, left, and Canadian Private George Price died just minutes from the 1918 Armistice that ended the fighting. (Supplied)

Then, at 10.58am, Canadian Private George Lawrence Price was fatally shot north of Mons by retreating Germans.

But, incredibly, he wasn’t the last Allied soldier to fall.

At 10.59am, US soldier Henry Gunther – part of a final charge against enemy positions – was shot dead.

He’s recognised to be the last soldier killed in action during World War I.